The New York Times had just published an account of a one-on-one dinner between Comey and the president. Comey maintains the president asked him, in that dinner, for his loyalty.

"He asked specifically of loyalty in the context of asking me to stay," Comey told the Senate intelligence committee. "My common sense told me, 'What's going on here is that he's looking to get something in exchange for granting my request to stay in the job.'"

Trump and Comey met again in February. In that meeting, Comey said the president asked him to let the investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn go. Comey wrote down his version of events in a memo. A few months later, Comey got fired, and the president got on his Twitter account.

Comey told the Senate intelligence committee: "There might be corroboration for our conversation, there might be a tape. And my judgment was, I needed to get that out into the public square."